


other half

by thisandthisandthis



Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Canon Compliant, F/F, F/M, Grief/Mourning, IPRE family, Introspection, M/M, Sibling Love, Taako has feelings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-04
Updated: 2020-06-04
Packaged: 2021-03-03 00:27:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,355
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24485854
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thisandthisandthis/pseuds/thisandthisandthis
Summary: “taako had felt the absence all his life. it came, like little pockets of night, at the strangest times. it tugged at his heart. its name rested just on the tip of his tongue. there was something missing, but for the life of him, he couldn’t figure out what.”(or)if lup is taako’s other half, and taako is lup’s other half, then who’s flying the plane?
Relationships: Barry Bluejeans & Taako, Barry Bluejeans/Lup, Carey Fangbattle/Killian, Kravitz/Taako (The Adventure Zone), Lup & Taako (The Adventure Zone), Magnus Burnsides & Taako, The Director | Lucretia & Taako
Comments: 19
Kudos: 82





	other half

**Author's Note:**

> hello & welcome to 6k of me projecting onto taako to cope
> 
> \- peach ([more fics](https://archiveofourown.org/users/thisandthisandthis/works) // [my tumblr](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/view/ezrisbian))

Taako had felt the absence all his life.

It came, like little pockets of night, at the strangest times. It tugged at his heart. Its name rested just on the tip of his tongue. There was something missing, but for the life of him, he couldn’t figure out what.

He felt it in the kitchen when he cooked — something telling him to make a plate for a person who wasn’t there. Something driving him to crowd aside, to make room for another set of working hands. Something urging him to weave across the floor in a sort of practiced dance, dodging invisible elbows, shifting to accommodate a shadow. Something deep in his gut telling him that things the way they were were all wrong.

This strange feeling, it permeated even the most private corners of his life. Tired and hungry for a laugh, he would fling himself into a chair, flicking through the pages of a novel until he came across a stupid line he liked, and then look up as if to read it to someone. The ghost of a laugh like bells found its way to his ears.

Taako was used to being alone. So why did he feel like he was half of a broken pair?

It was as though he had kept habits from another life — a life in which he always had someone by his side. Taako felt this absence every fucking day of his life. He wanted nothing more than to find out what it meant, or if he was just going crazy.

It was a low-level ache, a constant dull confusion. And this is what it was like.

He was with Kravitz one day. They were messing around at Kravitz’s place in the astral plane — well, Taako was messing around. He was trying to get a rise out of his boyfriend, who had recently returned from a particularly taxing mission. Taako’s mischief almost always made Kravitz smile. It usually led to some kissing, too, and Taako wasn’t about to pass that up. So he was screwing around, casting stupid cantrips and making Things That Should Not Move On Their Own move on their own. Kravitz was thus far unamused, but there was a reluctant fondness in his eyes as he watched Taako cast levitate on his grand piano and attempt to play Chopsticks whilst hovering five feet in the air.

“Darling, I’d hate for you to break something,” the reaper drawled, trying to sound exasperated and failing.

Taako levitated the piano bench, figuring that having a place to sit would probably help in his musical endeavor. ”Don’t worry babe, we’re just having a bit of fun!”

Kravitz rolled his eyes. “Not we. _You’re_ the one having fun.”

Taako faltered, his fingers hovering awkwardly over the keys. It lasted only for a moment, but Kravitz, sharp-eyed, noticed the pause.

“You alright?”

Taako dropped his hands ungracefully to the piano, creating a discordant noise. “Yeah. Uhm. Dunno why I said that.”

“It wasn’t a big mistake,” Kravitz said, cocking his head. He didn’t understand why Taako looked so suddenly lost. “Come down, love.”

The piano and its bench, with Taako perched cross-legged on top, floated easily down to the floor. As the furniture shifted back into its familiar grooves in the carpet, Taako slumped a little. He made no move to get up from the bench.

Kravitz approached him, his worry growing. “Taako, darling. Tell me what’s wrong.”

“Nothin’,” he mumbled, confusion written faintly in his brow. He felt like he was trying to remember the tune to a song he hadn’t heard in years. Forcing a laugh, he glanced back to his lover and said, “You’re staring. Have I got shmutz on my face?”

Kravitz knew Taako well enough to realize then that he shouldn’t pry any further. Instead he pressed gently a kiss to his lover’s worry-creased forehead. “No. But if you want, I can double check.” Taako smiled softly as Kravitz took his thin face into his hands, calloused thumbs brushing at his cheeks. They kissed, for quite a while, as they were often prone to do. Soon Taako had forgotten about the incident and Kravitz had forgotten to continue worrying and nothing mattered except for the other’s lips on theirs. Soon Taako was smiling stupidly into Kravitz’s black silk sheets and everything was right again.

* * *

There were times when he could forget. Especially when he was with Krav, it was easy to let go of those racing thoughts and just be. Kravitz felt like home — like a gentle collision of day and night, silent and strong and soft. With him, everything seemed a little simpler. Taako’s heart stopped beating so fucking fast all the time.

But no matter how wonderful Kravitz was, the lingering sense that Taako was missing something would always remain at the end of the day. He often muttered to himself, absentmindedly assuming that someone else was listening.

It was almost comforting, the consistency of his strange affliction. And this is what it was like.

He was with Magnus one day. They were moping around the Bureau, tired after each having had a long training session. Merle was off doing Pan knows what, and so, the two of them were stuck with each other.

Not stuck in the sense that it was displeasurable, of course. Taako was infinitely fond of Magnus. And Magnus of Taako, in a similar way. They were like brothers, though right now, neither would admit to something so sentimental.

Magnus was sitting on top of a crate at the far side of the training arena, whittling away at a the wooden grip of a broken practice sword. Taako paced, mumbling to himself. He wasn’t saying anything particularly interesting or important. He found it easier to think aloud, sometimes. His thoughts came easier when they weren’t just swimming silently around every which way in his mind.

Taako sighed and paused, both his feet and his brain tired of moving. He turned to watch Magnus, who was focused entirely on that round little piece of wood, the carving knife steady in his hands and his tongue sticking out of the corner of his mouth in concentration. There was something achingly familiar about it, and Taako smiled.

He crossed towards Magnus and plopped down on a nearby crate. “How’s it comin’ along?”

“Putting on the finishing touches,” Magnus said, grinning, and he thrust it up in the air like a trophy. A crude but recognizable little duck. Taako grinned.

At that moment, voices approached from outside the arena, and Carey and Killian appeared. Their hands were wrapped in fresh strips of cloth, and intertwined. “Hey Mags, hey Taako!” Carey grinned when she saw them. “Are you two planning on training in here? Killian and I are gonna spar, but we can go somewhere else if you two are using the arena.”

“Don’t worry,” Magnus said as he leaned back against the wall and crossed his legs. “We’re done for the day. Could use some entertainment, though, if you don’t mind us watching.”

“Oh, you’ll get entertainment all right.” Killian grinned and started stretching. “Carey, love, I’m gonna crush you.”

“You say that every time, honey.”

Once they had finished stretching, trading playful remarks, they simply looked at each other, and like a thought had passed between them without any words, they leapt into action.

Killian was big, bulky, forceful, and terrifying in battle. Of course right now she and Carey were simply sparring, but Taako could see the deadly power in her limbs as muscles flexed under the dark, sweat-slick surface. Carey, on the other hand, flew and flitted about Killian, scales flashing like storm waves, light as a petal on her feet and sharp as a thorn. She ducked and weaved and tricked her way out from under perfect blows. Killian was strong, but Carey was agile, and she turned battle into a sort of dance. They were opposites and perfectly matched.

When Carey slithered her way out of a near-flawless choke hold, throwing a grin back at Killian, Magnus chuckled. “God, she fights just like you,” he said, elbowing Taako in the ribs.

“Killian better watch out, then.” A wink and a smirk.

“Look how she moves... she could be your sister,” Magnus said.

And at that, something inside Taako felt very suddenly a chill like death.

He swallowed, and his throat was frozen. His hands and feet blocks of ungraceful ice weighing at the ends of limbs. “Uh,” Taako said. “Uhm.” He curled his hand into itself, nails digging into the soft flesh of his palm, and he watched in desperation for the blood to rush back into his skin.

Some awful _thing_ was thrumming in his chest with a silent intensity that buzzed in his ears and behind his eyes like static, a thousand points of violent movement. Cold, cold, cold. It refused to say its own name and yet demanded to be known.

 _I am missing,_ Taako thought. Discomfort like electricity forced his spine straight, his feet to the floor. _I am missing something._

“Have to go,” he mumbled, and stumbled out of the arena.

Taako’s quarters were a better space to breathe. There was no Carey laughing and twirling effortlessly away from Killian’s blows.

_Will it always be like this? Not understanding the gaping hole in my own heart?_

Taako slumped onto his bed, and for the first time in a while, let himself cry.

* * *

There is a state of unknowing. Of knowing that you do not know something. Of being aware of your own ignorance. Some called it true wisdom — Taako called it bullshit. He had lost a piece of himself that he cannot even remember. Somewhere, floating out in the vast universe, there was the answer to a question poised on the tip of his tongue, there was the punchline to an inside joke, there was the harmony to a duet, there was the other half of a pair.

It was bitter. An inexplicable longing that called itself _greedy_ and _dramatic_ and _coward_. And this is what it was like.

He was with Angus one day. You know this story — you’ve heard it, and likely seen it, in some shape or form. You’ve thought over it and wondered. And then you realized, and then you clamped a hand over your mouth, and then you might have felt just a fraction of what Taako felt, in that moment of realization.

In any case, this is familiar.

The three letters were like brands onto the backs of Taako’s eyelids.

So what the hell was this? What the hell was _LUP_ , and what the hell was the clawing grief in Taako’s chest, grief for something he was sure that he never had? His hands craved other hands. His ears craved a laugh he had never heard. His eyes craved a familiar smirking face, a mirror image, a reflection of himself that smiled back. Taako wanted to fucking scream. There was a loss like nothing he could ever put into words, and it was like he had never _not_ known this emptiness, like it was a fundamental piece of himself torn away at birth. _Am I destined to be dissatisfied? Am I just going to long for something nameless forever?_

And then.

The unimaginable happened. Armageddon was chasing the light from the sky. Lucretia looked at him with centuries worth of pain in her smile, and finally, finally, Taako remembered.

Taako _remembered_.

Lup, like a burst of sunlight in his memories. Lup, like a knife to his heart. And everything else.

It was agony to know these things and keep on living without her. The stabbing ache inside of him was a thousand times amplified and it screamed like a bone-deep wound that had reopened into nothing but salt and heat and the heady, licking fire of grief.

 _My sister. My sister. My twin sister._ Taako was drowning in the bright, fresh pain of those words, but he still somehow found the strength to stagger forward, to grab the umbra staff point it at Lucretia, _you took my sister from me._ He wasn’t even sure what was thought and what was spoken aloud, then. _You fucking took everything from me._

There was a terrifying moment when he was certain that he would kill her, and he didn’t care.

He just didn’t care.

* * *

It hadn’t been long since the inoculation, since Taako had to relearn these things and somehow continue to live with the weight of a hundred years on his chest. But it felt like an eternity. _There’s no time to dwell on this,_ he shouted at himself. _Stop acting like a baby. Fight. Get in there and fucking fight. She would want you to, she would._

So he did. He threw himself into battle alongside his family, or what was left of it, and he prayed to God that this wouldn’t all be in vain.

But then — something unexpected.

“Is this okay, sir?”

“Fuck, fine, go for it.”

A burst of flame. The kid, stumbling back. Taako was pushed away by the force, lying supine in the rubble and fog. His head spinning. His thoughts nothing more than jumbled emotion. There was the unmistakable feeling that _she_ was begging to be set free — somehow, Taako knew without a doubt in his mind that Lup, that missing piece of him, that shard of his heart, was closer and stronger and more desperate than ever before. And then the source of that emotion was tossed into his trembling hands. Through blurred vision and biting pain and the sound of blood rushing in his ears, a sudden crack. A vicious snap over his knee. The release of decades worth of anger and spite and waiting and hoping and trying and _love_.

And then she was there.

Taako knew, the moment the umbra staff cracked clean in two, that he would have her back. His faith in her, he realized, was and had always been absolute. Lup would never back out on a promise. And if she had promised to return, she certainly would do it in style.

 _Phantasmal and resplendent._ Like a burst of pure energy. Fireworks. _Fire_. More concentrated magic in a single space than Taako had ever felt. Like an eruption, or a declaration, or a revelation. Crimson smoke and white hot light swirling like it was the birth of the universe all over again.

Lup.

Her scarlet robes whipped about her as she hovered above it all. Her body was nothing more than a shambling mass of shadows, only loosely elf-shaped, twisting and dark and saturated with powerful magic. Her lich form was intangible and incomprehensible, but somehow, Taako knew that she was smiling at him.

And like always, she knew just what to say.

_“You’re dating the grim reaper?”_

Taako didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. So of course, he did both.

* * *

This story may be misleading.

It may give you the impression that Taako feels the desire to cry often, or allows himself to cry often, or even cries in front of others often. After reading this account, you may even believe that Taako is fond of showing emotion. This is not true.

There are exactly two emotions that Taako is ever eager to flaunt, and they are Pride and Annoyance. That is how Taako goes through his life. He brags and he complains and somehow, somehow, it’s charming, because people love him, and why the fuck should he ruin that with something as distasteful as vulnerability?

It was always Lup who coaxed that out of him. She didn’t care that he had an ugly side. A side that cried and screamed like a kid and hated the world sometimes. They knew each other, inside and out. So maybe that was why her voice seemed to open something inside him then, to strip him bare after decades of hiding behind jokes. Her voice like a balm. Like a prayer, or a cool hand to the feverish forehead. Her voice like a promise: _I am here. And I will not leave you again._

* * *

“Yeah, I knew you’d figure it out eventually.” The smoke was dissipating as Lup floated to the ground. Even if Taako couldn’t see her smile, it was there in her words, coloring them bright and warm.

Taako wiped at his eyes in an attempt to be discreet. “Oh no, I knew. I mean I knew, for sure, I knew.” He was rambling as he got back up onto his feet. There was still a laugh on his lips and traitorous tears in his eyes, and he watched as Lup touched the ground, standing finally in front of him.

“From the very beginning?” asked Merle. His voice was a bit dazed, as though he wasn’t even focused on the words that were being exchanged, just the woman in front of them, who had been gone for so, so long.

Taako gathered himself and grinned. “Yeah, right away.”

“Well why didn’t you let me out sooner, dingus?”

“Well I didn’t even remember you existed, goofus.”

Every word was like a healing. Taako was a shattered vase pieced back together with gold. He was a fruit tree that finally sprouted. He was a brother again, a brother, a brother, and _oh,_ how sacred that word, how much holier than any temple. _Brother_.

Barry stumbled towards Lup, love and shock so strong in his veins that they made his hands shake as he reached out. “I— I knew I’d see you again, I... I wanna— I’m gonna— I’m gonna blow myself up, just so I can be a lich and _hold_ you again, h-hold on —“

“Don’t blow yourself up, babe, I’m sure your beautiful body’s gonna get killed by the Hunger soon enough.” Lup’s voice was impossibly fond, and Barry melted.

“Lup, when...” he started. “Lup, when I was a lich I knew you were gone, and it was more than I could bear, but when I was alive, I didn’t know you’d ever existed, which was more than I could bear, I didn’t...” He shook his head, at a loss for words. “I didn’t...”

“Babe, I love you more than life and undeath itself,” she said, stepping towards him, and there was a terrible longing in her movement. “But let’s get somewhere safe, so we can really savor this tender reunion.”

Barry smiled at her and then looked at Taako, and there was a revelation that passed between them. _This is the woman we know. This is the woman we love. And she is back, and she is back._

Taako was buoyant. For a few moments he hardly registered the words that were being spoken around him, only the warm sound of his sister’s voice, of his _family’s_ voices, and all of the grating emptiness inside him was filled with it and filled with it and filled with it, until there was no way for him to exist except to drown in this feeling of perfect togetherness.

When Davenport sent Lup to find the Starblaster with Barry and told Taako and the others to stay, Taako couldn’t even find it in himself to be angry about the separation. Lup was back and that was all that mattered.

 _From the very beginning?_ Merle had asked, and it was only then that Taako realized that it was true. For as long as he could remember, he had known. He just hadn’t had the words to express the depth of his own loss. There was no poetry to do justice to this feeling — it was a homecoming and a gentle victory, the missing piece of himself returned.

Lup was back and that was all that mattered.

* * *

There was, of course, more to be done. The Hunger was approaching like a wave high on the black horizon, impossibly big and still getting impossibly bigger with every idle moment. Taako had a duty to do — and reunited with his family under their captain, he knew he was going to fight until his last breath, or at least until Lup’s, and God, was there even a difference anymore? Had there ever been?

On the deck of the Starblaster, bracing themselves on the railing, Taako stood with Magnus and Merle at his side. There was a writhing mass of nightmarish black in front of them. The Hunger manifested itself to the eyes the way a scream does to the ears — jagged and agonizing and consuming, like a bath of shattered glass.

Still the Starblaster shot onwards like a bullet into its midst.

_Not yet._

Taako could feel the air whipping at his face, sharp as nails, and he smiled.

_Alright, buddy. Dance for me._

This was it.

The following battle itself was a blur. There was Troth and Joaquin and Garfield and Roswell and Fisher and the power bear, there was color and motion and fear and exhilaration. Taako was caught up in the taste of copper and adrenaline. The roar of a green wind around him. In those final moments of battle all he knew was the grip of his family’s hands steadying him, and his own resolve, his hand on the immovable staff, and a light, brighter than both of the suns of his homeworld.

Taako wasn’t thinking then, only feeling, and when the Starblaster gave them a way home, the only word on his lips was _Lup_. He knew that she was still alive, he felt it as surely as he felt his own chest rising and falling with every breath, but he wanted desperately to be by her side. It had been far too long.

But then — when he leapt through that portal, the world was already winning the fight. And Lucretia was still on the other side. A hand outstretched. Frozen in time. Waiting.

Taako knew that he owed it to her to stay. She was as much family to him as Magnus and Merle were. He hadn’t yet found it in himself to forgive her, but God help him if he wouldn’t still give his life for her in an instant. His love was a stubborn thing. Lucretia needed him more than Lup, and the decision was hard to swallow, but it was the right thing to do.

_Play it cool. Be the Taako they need, the Taako that jumps right back into battle and fights for his family without a second thought._

“Hey, it seems like they’ve got it,” he said lightly as he leapt back through the portal and landed next to his friends. “So I’m good to hang.” The goddess, whose form was outlined in a softly pulsing light, gave him an almost imperceptible nod, and smiled.

“Are you guys... one hundred percent?” Magnus was already glancing back to where the Hunger swarmed, itching to fight.

“Yeah, fuck it.” Taako swallowed and readied himself for whatever was to come.

“Let’s go,” Merle shouted, and as Magnus grinned at Istus and slapped her a double low-five, her figure faded away into nothingness, and time restarted.

There was a rift. A pause. Her voice.

_“You’re going to be amazing.”_

And then — into battle.

* * *

The strange part about being whole again was this: not only did Taako finally remember Lup, but he remembered himself as well. If Lup _was_ that part of him, or if it was just some lost piece of self that Lucretia had erased, he didn’t care. All that mattered was that he had been broken and now he was not.

The end of it all was an overdue exhale. As he watched his family embrace one another, his heart swelled in a way that he hadn’t felt in years.

“Hey everyone! Johann was right! We won!” The kid was beaming like never before atop Magnus’ shoulders.

“We _won!”_ Magnus echoed with a victorious shout, punching a fist high into the air. Angus laughed and the sound was pure joy. He threw his head back and grinned, and Magnus’ eyes twinkled, and Taako felt love wash over him like a dazzling shaft of sunlight. This was his family, and they were back, and they were safe.

Near where Magnus was standing, Lup was embracing Lucretia as best she could in her lich form. When they broke apart, Taako saw that Lucretia had been crying, and he turned away. Did he have any right to see that? Before he had the chance to get together his thoughts, though, Barry approached him and brought him into a sweeping hug. His face was lit up like the sky and he grinned as he pulled away.

“We did it,” he said breathlessly. “You did it.”

“Glad someone recognizes my valuable contributions,” Taako said. He immediately pulled Barry back into an embrace. “You make it out okay?”

“Oh, sure,” Barry said. “I’ll be fine. Undead, and all that. What about you?”

“Thank God for Merle,” Taako said, and Barry laughed.

For a few moments, the two of them just took in the scene — Lucretia, kneeling in the grass and smiling at Angus as he gushed excitedly to her; Davenport, reaching out to shake Merle’s hand and letting out a joyous laugh when Merle swept him up in a big hug; Magnus, giving Lup a playful punch in the shoulder and stumbling forwards with a bark of laughter when his fist went straight through her intangible lich form. Taako felt heavy with love. He wanted to celebrate with them, with his family, but something deep inside wondered if he deserved that, after what he said to Lucretia. After what he almost did to her.

He shook his head and sighed.

Magnus and Lup approached him and Barry after a moment. “Hey, my favorite boys,” Lup said, her low voice soft with fondness. “How are you two holding up?”

“Pretty well, considering,” Barry said. His face was glowing with affection.

“Well, personally, I’ve been better.” Taako cracked a smile.

“Taako...” Lup started, turning towards him, and if she hadn’t been in her lich form, he might have seen her eyes welling with tears. “C’mere, you doofus.”

She wrapped arms made of mist around him, and he rested his chin on a shoulder that wasn’t there.

“I missed you so much,” she whispered.

“I wish I did too,” he said.

He tried to hold her closer, if that was even possible.

After a moment, Lup pulled back and grinned, hovering a few inches off the ground. “God, the minute I get my body back, I am going to hug my brother so tightly,” she announced sweetly, “and then I am going to bone my husband.”

Barry jumped. “Your _husband?”_

“Yeah, dumbass, that’s you.”

“We’re—“

“Babe, we’ve known each other for over a century, and we’ve been madly in love for most of that time, I think we can skip the formalities and just say we’re married.”

“Gods, someone — someone fucking blow me up, right now, so I can be a lich and —”

“Don’t get ahead of yourself, sweetheart,” Lup said, and she stroked one intangible hand across his very tangible and very flushed cheek. “I’ll be back to normal soon enough. I’ll — I’m sure there’s something of mine back on the Starblaster, some clothing, we can get a piece of my hair off of it and grow me a new body, it’ll be easy, as long as we have access to a cloning facility —“

“We do,” Magnus said proudly.

“Oh, wonderful.” Lup sighed in relief. “Could you two... do you mind...” She gestured vaguely towards the ship.

“‘Course not, babe,” Barry said, and blew her a kiss. “One strand of hair, comin’ right up.” As he and Magnus started towards the ship, Lup turned once again her gaze to Taako, and she softened.

“Are you sure you’re alright?” she asked.

“Didja have to tell the whole world about your sex life with Barry?” he teased.

“Oh, like _that_ was bad! The umbra staff was in the room when you first got it on with Kravitz, y’know, I had to sit through that whole show.”

Taako‘s face suddenly bore an awfully striking resemblance to Lup’s robes.

She giggled. “Wish I could give that particular memory to Fisher, huh?”

“God almighty, where is that fucking fish?”

The two of them laughed together for the first time in far too long, and for a moment, Lup’s shadowy face almost seemed to get a bit brighter.

“In all seriousness, though,” Lup said, after the moment had passed. “Taako, babe, are you sure you’re okay?”

“Two of my best friends jus’ got married, ‘course I’m okay,” he said, and to his great annoyance, his voice wobbled.

Lup sighed. “Hey, stop this for a sec. You know you can talk to me.”

He clamped his traitorous mouth shut.

“Taako. Please.”

When he didn’t speak, she followed his gaze past her and saw that he was looking at Lucretia.

“Oh, no this isn’t about —“

“Lup, I almost killed her.”

“I was still in the umbra staff. I would have stopped you.“

“But I would have done it. I would have chosen to do it.”

She was quiet.

“I was so fucking angry, and I would have done it. I’m still angry.” He put his face in his hands. “What the fuck is wrong with me?”

“Don’t you know that she understands? Taako, I promise you, she knows what you went through. She went through it herself.”

“No she _didn’t,”_ Taako snapped, and his sister flinched. “...Sorry. I’m sorry, Lup, I just... there’s no way she knew what she did to me. No way. She took away half...” His voice broke into a fragile whisper. “Half of my soul. Do you have any idea what it was like?”

The swirling darkness that constituted Lup’s figure seemed suddenly to move faster. She was part woman and part hurricane, and she reached out as if by instinct to touch Taako, before faltering. Stormcloud fingers hovered over his arm.

“I can’t imagine,” she started, and she sounded wrecked, devastated, ancient. “I can’t imagine what it would be like to lose you. To not remember you at all. I’m so sorry.”

“Not your fault,” Taako managed. “But. But it’s not really Lucretia’s, either. She had to do it. Didn’t she? Was there even a choice to begin with?”

“...I don’t think so.”

“Then why can’t I stop blaming her?” he rasped, and his voice was like splintered wood, and finally, finally, he broke in two.

Lup had never cursed her own body more. Oh, what she would have given to be able to wipe away his tears.

* * *

Taako sat and watched his sister’s body grow from nothingness.

Thanks to Carey and Killian, the Bureau of Balance had held its own during the fight, and most of the facilities were still intact. The training arenas, Fisher’s tank, Fantasy Costco, and by extension, Garfield’s cloning vat. He’d let them use it as a begrudging _thank you_ for keeping his business alive. “If the world had been destroyed, I wouldn’t have any more customers,” he had said, and it was a generally undisputed conclusion throughout the Bureau.

Taako didn’t know how to describe life as it was. Things were evidently not the same — and yet. Magnus still laughed at Merle’s bad jokes. Merle still wore amaryllis flowers in his beard. Lucretia still shook her head fondly at their stupid antics. Kravitz still showed up at inopportune times in his reaper form. Angus still gushed about his detective stories to anyone who would listen.

With Lup, Barry, and Davenport back, it was like coming home.

Taako squinted at the vat of cloudy liquid in front of him. Lup’s body was fully formed, but still hard to see. There were legs, lithe and long. Thin hips. A bumpy spine just like his own. Hair that floated like a lazy halo and glowed white under artificial light. The body had its back to him, and he was glad. Taako didn’t know what he would have done if he had seen her face so drained of life.

“Hey,” came her voice from behind him.

“Hey.” He didn’t turn around. He tried to imagine that it was the body in front of him speaking.

“How long’ve you been in here, huh?”

“Dunno.” Taako sighed. “Are you gonna...?”

“Yep, it’s done cooking. Today’s the day.”

He let out a small breath. “‘Kay, I’ll... give you some privacy, I guess. I dunno how this works.”

She laughed. “Haven’t you technically been staring at my ass this whole time?”

“I am not —! You dingus, I just miss you.” Taako faced her and saw that somewhere in the shadows of her undead face, she was grinning.

“I’m right here.”

Taako thought of linked arms and playful punches. He thought of the laughing glimmer in Lup’s warm brown eyes.

“You know what I mean.”

She sighed. “Yeah, I do.”

“So, I’ll leave you to it, huh?” Taako stood and started to make his way out of the room.

“Lucretia’s waiting for you outside,” Lup blurted then, and he stopped mid-movement, his shoulders tensing. “I asked her to come. Thought you’d be here.”

“Lup,” he started.

“You need to talk to her.”

“I really don’t, actually.”

“She loves you. Please, Taako, go to her. It’s been eating her up just like it has been you.”

“Yeah, why d’you think I’ve been avoiding her,” he muttered, but started out all the same, a weight growing heavier in his stomach with every step that he took towards the door. _God, she’ll hate me for it, won’t she? She’ll hate the fact that I still haven’t forgiven her, even though it’s the only fucking thing I want to do._

* * *

Lucretia was standing stiffly by the doorway, fiddling with a ring on her finger. “Taako,” she said as he stepped out to meet her. “How have you been?”

“Well, you know,” he said, suddenly very self-conscious.

“I’m...“ Lucretia crossed her arms over her chest and took a shaky breath. “I need you to know, Taako, that I don’t expect you to forgive me. I will never be able to understand what I did to you by taking away Lup. And even if I apologized for the rest of my life, I still wouldn’t be able to make up for it. You... have a right to be angry with me. Honestly, you have a right to hate me for it. So I understand if you don’t care for my companionship any longer. I just... I guess I needed to tell you that everything I did was because I love you, and because I wanted to keep you safe. I know that’s not an excuse, I just want you to understand. Gods, I’m fucking this up even more, aren’t I?” She turned her head to the sky and laughed wearily. “Please know... that I don’t expect anything from you. I don’t deserve it. And I’m fine with that.”

Taako was shocked silent for a moment, until he said stupidly, “What?”

She shifted, smiling a bit sadly. “I said I’m fine with that.”

“No, I —“ Taako shook his head. “Look, if I was a more eloquent kind of guy, I might have said the same thing to you. About forgiving, I mean.”

“You don’t need to —“

“Yes, I do. And it’s past time I say something to you about it. I— I’m sorry, I almost... Lucretia, I threatened you, I almost...” To Taako’s great irritation, the next words got caught in his throat, and he looked down at his feet.

“You had every right,” she whispered, and somehow, that made him feel even worse.

“No,” he said, fumbling to grasp her hands in his own. “You need to stop saying that. I mean, yeah, forgiving you is hard, all of this is hard. But you... I put your life in danger, and there’s no excuse for that. You mean... the world to me. To all of us. I need you to know how sorry I am. God, I’m not good at this.”

Lucretia’s eyes glittered with tears. “How ‘bout we call it even?” she said.

“...Yeah. Even.”

She paused, then, blinking away a tear that threatened to slip down her cheek. “I could never hate you. You know that, right?”

Taako gave her a cheeky smile. “‘Course you couldn’t, look at me.” He struck a halfhearted pose.

“There’s my Taako,” she laughed, and pulled him into an embrace. She was warm and solid and when she breathed out against his neck, something inside of him lifted.

“Hey, you two.”

Oh.

He stilled at the sound, blinked once, and swallowed. “Hey, uhm. Lucretia? As much as I’m enjoying this tender moment, I’d like to go hug my sister, if you don’t mind.”

She pulled away. “Of course.”

Taako turned to face Lup. There was a lightness, a bubbling giddy sort of feeling in his chest that made him want to sing. And this is what it was like.

Her eyes were wide and joyous as she ran forward to fling her arms around him, laughing and laughing and laughing like the sound was music to her own ears, and then her thin, familiar arms were looping around him, like mirrors of his own — and when she fell into his chest with a bright shout, they tumbled to the ground, kneeling in the dirt like careless kids, burying their faces in each others’ shoulders as Lup’s pale golden hair was catching in his mouth, and he spat it out with a laugh and tightened his embrace and leaned closer, closer, closer, because here was his _sister_ and he could touch her again, could see her eyes twinkle again, could watch her face crinkle into a smile again, could _hold_ her again.

“You knocked me over, stupidhead, now my skirt’s dirty,” he said into her hair.

“Yeah, well you’re getting me all wet,” she replied, and it was then that Taako realized he was crying.

“Shuddup.”

“Never.”

The feeling was like remembering all over again. Like bubbling over. Like coming into bloom. Like finding yourself, over and over, in someone else’s smile, and forgetting what it meant to ever be alone.

It was finally being _whole_ again.

**Author's Note:**

> this turned out very emotional!! more so than i planned hehe but i hope you enjoyed :)
> 
> obviously not all dialogue is mine — some canon dialogue lines appear in sections 3, 4, 6, 7, & 8.
> 
> thanks for reading! comments and kudos are always appreciated <3
> 
> em hotep xx
> 
> \- peach ([more fics](https://archiveofourown.org/users/thisandthisandthis/works) // [my tumblr](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/view/ezrisbian))


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